here’s a little report of the Wake Up show in Milano, thanks to TheDon.
SAN
alexone
Speerstra Gallery: selling graffiti the right way
Like it or not, graffiti appeared in galleries in New York pretty soon (1972, Hugo Martinez and United Graffiti Artists). In Europe, there’s only few galleries that deal with graffiti art anly, and Speerstra is surely amongst the best. We are very happy to publish this few questions that we asked to Willelm, the man behind this great gallery that featured the most important oldschool writers from New York.
1. First of all I’d like to know something more about yourself, if you are\were a writer and how did you enter the graffiti world.
Willem Speerstra born 1972 / Amsterdam / Holland.
I was not a writer , but discovered Graffiti at 11 years old, when my father bought a painting from Dondi in New York in 1983, I guess because I saw this wonderful painting up on the wall of my home, I really started to become interested in the graffiti movement.
In 1983, graffiti was already around Amsterdam and I was already seeing works by Shoe and Delta etc… in the city In 1984 came out the book “subway art” and this was the real start of my passion for graffiti. Hip Hop was going strong , really great times… Started buying graffiti paintings very early for my own collection around 1991.
2. I’d like you to tell me how Speerstra gallery was born, how did you have the idea of opening a gallery focused on graffiti writing
The “Speerstra Gallery” adventure started in Paris in September 2001. (before I worked for and with other persons) .
The idea, is that there was no idea. After working for a cartoon company (1994- 1999) I just decided by passion to open my own gallery space. The start was difficult but after one year clients started to appreciated and to understand the artists and were they came from.
3. Why do you focus on graffiti and not on other “street” stuff, that is probably more easy to sell (isn’t it?).
I is not a question of making money but more of what I like to collect and to sell, old school artists from New york and recently younger graffiti artists from Europe (alexone, Mist, Dare…) are my favourites and are much appreciated by my clients.
I do not really care what is fashionable to sell, toys, t-shirts, etc…
I am not into “stencil Art” and “Street Art”, but I do respect both movements, on the Streets and in galleries of course.
“Street art” (and not stencil art) has only been around since 2002, so for me it to early to collect and I am more like wait and see what happens regarding the today’s art market.
4. You are open since many years, do you see a trend in the graffiti art market? Which ones are the main artists that we can find in the international indexes (such as artprice) and on sale at Sotheby’s, Bonhams and the like?
There has always been a trend in Graffiti art, but these last 5 years have been really crazy, I guess advertising and other media has indirectly promoted the movement.
Not to forget that most of today’s graffiti collectors were around 5 /10 years old when it all started… today they have the money to buy beautiful works and they do. Concerning the index, all artists are to be found but only very recently due to international sales. Jonone, Quick, Crash… they are all being represented at very good sales. And the prices of the works are only at the beginning… Wait and see.
As I always like to say; in the Us there are two big art movements that occurred at the end of the last century: Pop Art and Graffiti art, and only is still alive “Graffiti an unstoppable world wide movement, each year thousands of young kids playing the game and practicing their passion for the love of their art” respect!
first gallery I worked there in 1989 - 1991 in Monté Carlo, it was called: B5 Gallery. I worked there as a art curator for the following shows from artists like:
Crash, Daze, Futura 2000.
I then moved to Paris and was also an art curator for the “Gallery Michel Gillet” Organized shows from 1992 -1994:
First solo show of Sharp called “from the gates of the ghetto” Jonone’s first solo show.
Also participated in a show called “Graffiti Art” at Musée National des monuments Français by lending old shool paintings for this show.
From 1994-1999 worked for a cartoon company based in Paris.
Opened my own gallery called the “Speerstra Gallery” in September 2001 at 4 rue du perche 75003 Paris.
Organized 26 shows in 5 years. Mainly New York old School artists. Sharp, Jonone, Crash, Daze, Henry Chalfant…
And also French Graffiti artists: Alëxone, Honet, Rcf1…
Closed the Gallery in Paris in December 2006.
Moved to Bursins in Switzerland in January 2007 to open a 300 square meters gallery and have had 4 shows in 2007 and will have 7 shows for 2008.
2009 is in preparation: Daze, Hérvé Di Rosa, Quick, Sharp…
“We come at night” book
Ekosystem adds an interesting review of the book “We come at night”, out for the excellent publisher Die Gestalten Verlag. The book documents the “Outside” street art campaign, held in Wuppertal (Germany) in 2006. I remember a nice article by R. Malpensa, published in Garage Magazine (#11, January 2007), pretty critical towards that event. I’d like to share it, since it contains some good thoughts about the use of street art as a promotional instrument, and the conflict it (could) arise in a graffiti environment. Sorry for the poor quality of the images below… but what matters is the content.
(you can find the full article - with images - in Garage 11, January 2007)
Parallel Strokes - A book about graffiti and typography
“Parallel Strokes - A book about graffiti and typography” Just arrived in my mailbox.
It’s one of the best books I read this year (together with Art Inconsequence), mixing some of my favourites writers with a bunch of cool type designers, such as Underware and Ed Fella (you may know its work for House Industries type foundry).
The Chaz Bojorquez interview, alone, is worth the 20$ I paid for the book (waiting for Chaz monography… should be out soon). The volume is a collection of well selected interviews, with lots of meaningful discussions, about either graffiti or typography. The juxtaposition of the two (strictly related) topics makes this book a great work: it is a research project, in a world of coffee table books.
Unluckily, the book is printed in one color only (magenta on white pages, as you can see from the flicks above): even if it’s ok for most typographical works, it really sucks when it comes to multicolored graffiti pieces. Not that I care about multicolored graffiti pieces, anyway.
What else to say, tha author Ian Lynam writes on ping mag, shipping is free world wide, that’s a free poster inside and with the weak dollar… that’s a deal. You can buy it here Parallel Strokes or download an excerpt here.
Interviews with
Gimme Five… Yoga PEVS MF FIC
One of the most original train bombers in Italy: Yoga! (thank you Yoga for the flicks!)
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